Your image remains even as you fade from view
by MazePhoenix
Summary: Will and Hannibal meet in their memory palaces. So what is real?
Will walks into his memory palace nightly.
In dreams, even as Molly sleeps beside him, he can't help but recall the past.  
Some of the rooms are adjacent with his dark twin, his equal and opposite, his tormentor and would-be lover: Hannibal.  
He finds Hannibal there, and talks with him.  
He says things he's never dared say before.  
Hannibal is someone who knows him better than anyone, even Jack.

*  
This night he imagines Hannibal; pristine in a white suit that has small drops of blood on it.  
"Will," he says, voice deep and smooth as ever.  
"Hannibal," he acknowledges.  
"What do you want, while you are in bed with your wife?"  
"Perfect clarity. Stillness. Peace. I don't want to think of you."  
"And yet you do."  
"Yet I do. Because you are my other half, and it hurts."  
"We can never be separated. Not even in death. I would always find you."  
"I know that now."  
"You've always known."  
"No prison can ever hold you. You are the very devil."  
"I've been on earth a far shorter time than he."  
"If that's your best defense, then you are not even denying your wickedness."  
"It's not wickedness. God sent Lucifer to the earth to tempt mankind."  
"And I fell for you. I should hate you."  
"Do you?"  
"You killed Beverly and displayed her, you killed Abigail. I do. I never want to see you again."  
"You will see me again."  
"I don't want to. I don't want this with you. Why is my soul mate evil?"  
"We cannot chose who we love."  
"Did you want this with me?"  
"No. It crept up on me unawares, while I was planning other things."  
"You want it to stop, then?"  
"No. It fascinates and delights me daily. You surprise me. Not many people can do that."  
"Are you in love with me?"  
"Yes. Do you ache for me?"  
"Yes. With every heartbeat and every fiber of my being I long for your touch and your words," says Will and leaves the palace.

*  
In Bloom's prison Hannibal recalls every atom of Will Graham's body and his mind.  
He knows Will is his, and always will be.  
Molly has no claim on him.

*  
Another late night and Will senses Molly's even breathing and he enters the foyer of his memory palace.  
Hannibal is there.  
"You said you loved me," says Will.  
"I do," replies Hannibal, solemnly.  
"We've never touched like lovers do."  
"We transcend the physical. Acts of love begin in the mind."  
"So..you don't desire me physically?"  
"I never said that. I do."  
"Would you kiss me now?"  
"I shall kiss the lies from your mouth," says Hannibal and presses a kiss to the corner of his mouth.  
"Not enough," says Will and pulls him in for a deeper kiss. Hannibal hands card though his hair, and he smiles.  
Will's hands grip Hannibal's shoulders, they are stable and the smell of expensive cologne mingles with sweat.  
Will pushes a leg between Hannibal's and brushes against his cock.  
Hannibal's hand finds Will's cock and he rubs it.  
Will slips away, dizzy with pleasure.  
"Does that answer your question?" asks Hannibal.  
"Yes," says Will. He goes back to his marital bed.  
He remains hard but does not touch himself or Molly.

Hannibal smiles.  
He feels the taste of Will's lips.  
He feels Will's desperate arousal and his doubt.  
This is his Will.  
Hannibal even smiles at Alana.  
She never would have understood him.  
Will, however..

*  
Will enters the palace and looks at the skull graven in the floor.  
This is who he loves and desires.  
Hannibal himself smiles.  
"Will," he says. "Did our little tryst unnerve you?"  
"I'm not some blushing virgin. But, yes. Would you take me?"  
"In what sense?"  
"Would you sodomize me?"  
"I would."  
"Do you want me to be your catamite?"  
"I want you to be mine."  
"I am."  
"Come here.." says Hannibal and he does.  
It's not real so he can.  
Hannibal's lips find his and his hand pumps Will's cock.  
Will sees his demon lover, beautiful and lethal.  
"Take me," he says.  
It's a dream and so his clothes are already gone.  
Hannibal's strong hands cover him, and draw him closer.  
If it were real the strong grip would leave bruises.  
His lover pushes inside him, and he shakes.  
His form is shaken by his lover's thrusts and he feels him go so deep they can never part.  
It's like Hannibal wants to burrow all the way down to his bones.  
Will pushes back, giving it his all.  
He comes, his features a death mask of pleasure.  
He feels Hannibal's release in the depths of his being.  
"I love you," he says.  
"I love you, Will," says Hannibal.

*  
Hannibal wakes to find semen on his stomach. It's not his own.  
Will is his now.  
This did really happen.  
They did forge a bond beyond time and space.  
He can leave prison soon.  
Will Graham will follow wherever he goes.

*  
Will awakes beside Molly, and he feels well used and loved. His skin is bruised, and he's sore from Hannibal's lovemaking. He knows what he must do now.

*  
Will walks into his demon lover's prison.  
"Hello Hannibal," he says, a flirtatious tone to it.  
"Will," says Hannibal as if that one word can contain all he needs to say.  
Maybe it can.


End file.
